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The toeholds made by the Big Four accounting firms in the U.S. legal market are looking more like footprints.

Already a force in the legal space of many countries worldwide, the Big Four are prohibited by individual state bar association rules from practicing law in the U.S. Yet over the past several years, they’ve maneuvered to insert themselves into the U.S. legal services market. …

One of the latest developments is an alliance announced in May between employment law firm Epstein Becker & Green and Deloitte Legal. The move brings together Epstein’s labor, employment, and workforce management expertise with Deloitte’s multidisciplinary approach and global reach to address “a confluence of legal and business challenges for employers that can no longer be separated or dealt with in isolation,” according to the joint press release.

Epstein is a U.S. firm with offices across the country. The alliance offers advisory services to multinational companies in areas such as employment policies, restructurings, and M&A.

“We work together to make a joint pitch, to put together a joint RFP,” said Steven Di Fiore, chief operating officer of Epstein Becker & Green. Epstein performs the work pertaining to the U.S., and Deloitte does the international work, “but we are working together and delivering one product to the client,” he said. For example, the firms are conducting a worldwide pay equity review and analysis for a multinational corporation with 20,000 employees, 10,000 of whom are in the U.S., he noted.

“What we are really doing is responding to demand from clients for holistic, workforce management solutions that are seamless across borders,” said David Garland, chair of the employment, labor, and workforce management steering committee at Epstein Becker & Green. “We are responding to what the market is telling us.”

These advances by the Big Four mean Big Law will be competing in a broader arena, in terms of disciplines and types of expertise. Often, that will mean providing more value in key areas or focusing on narrower specialties.